


Working Late

by Bluewolf458



Category: The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 08:28:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16552352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: Blair has been working late at Rainier. On the way back to his car, he's attacked...





	Working Late

Working Late

by Bluewolf

It was late. _Hell,_ Blair thought as he walked briskly towards the parking lot, _it was later than late._

Certainly he had warned Jim that he would be at Rainier, grading papers, well into the night. And he hadn't been the only one. Many of the other TAs were, to his certain knowledge, doing the same, after getting a stern warning from Chancellor Edwards that morning that taking papers home to grade was unprofessional.

"You should be able to allocate your time more efficiently," she had snapped, ignoring the fact that if the TAs were in their 'offices' any conscientious student could knock on their doors - and they were expected to respond to those students, even if they were lying on the floor half dead from a heart attack. "Taking papers to correct at home shows that you have been wasting time, possibly gossiping over an unnecessary cup of coffee.

"And you needn't try protesting that the cleaning staff object to your offices not being empty when they arrive during the evening. I'll be having a word with them as well. They should be able to adjust their work so that they clean your offices during their morning shift.

"I want all papers graded here, before you go home."

Blair was far from certain that the tenured professors at Rainier didn't also take their work home, but there was less she could do about them.

He had, however, made up his mind that in future he would give more multiple choice questions, which would speed up the grading; although it would also give him less idea about how well the students were understanding the work they were doing. But he was far from happy about taking the poorly lit path that led to the parking lot in the middle of the night; everyone knew that when the campus grounds were deserted university personnel working late had several times been attacked. At least one of the female TAs had pointed this out to Edwards, who had simply responded by telling her that if she applied herself diligently to her work, she wouldn't need to be in the grounds late enough for the campus to be deserted.

 _Yeah, right!_ Blair thought as he hurried down the path. _How late do you ever work, Chancellor?_

He was pushing his car key into the lock when a rough voice snarled, "Just step back from the car, buster!"

Blair took a deep breath and obeyed. The figure standing just a couple of yards from him had a scarf wrapped around his lower face, and was clearly armed with a gun.

"And I'll have your wallet."

Blair moved slowly, removed his wallet from his pocket and tossed it over. The man opened it one-handed and stared for a second at the contents before growling, "Is _this_ all you have?"

"I'm a TA, man; I'm not paid till the end of the month. What's in there has to do me for food - and gas - until then." _Jim, now would be a great time for you to come looking for me!_

"Six dollars?"

Blair grinned. "You can get some still-edible food from the out-of-date stuff in supermarket dumpsters. It's not only the homeless who go there to collect stuff past its 'best before' date. Means I can keep most of the pittance I get from the university for gas." _And that was definitely true before I met Jim!_

"What's in your pack?"

"Books," Blair said. "And seriously, none of the used book stores are going to want University course books at this point in the semester; they'd have them on their shelves for nearly nine months, just taking up space, before anyone went looking to buy them." _Thank goodness I left the laptop in my office! As well as my credit card and police credentials!_

"All right." He took the six dollars from the wallet and tossed it back to Blair, then - still keeping the gun pointing at Blair - slid into the driver's seat and pushed the key into the ignition.

Nothing happened. He tried again. Nothing.

"You have something disabling this?" he snarled.

"No. She needs a service but I can't afford one till the end of the month. She should start if you keep turning on the ignition a few times. Once she starts she'll keep going for five or six miles before she cuts out. Then you have to let her cool down before she'll start again. I could actually walk here faster, but at least in the car I'm dry when it's raining."

"Cascade PD!" a voice said. "Just drop the gun and get out of the car. Now!"

The man obeyed, but glared at Blair. "You somehow manage to call the cops, buster?"

"No - but you delayed me so much my big brother here obviously decided to come looking for me."

"Oh - " Jim said - "another thing; you can give my brother back the money you took from his wallet."

"Six lousy dollars! And what was with the out of date food from the dumpsters?” He glared at Blair. “If your brother was expecting you home - "

"Not a total lie, man - I've had to feed myself that way in the past. My brother was away from Cascade for a few years and I had to fend for myself. But then he came home..." He grinned at Jim.

In the distance, they heard a siren, and a minute later a patrol car pulled up beside them.

"This your thief, Detective?"

"Yes. Attempted theft of a car. Get him booked for that - anything more, I'll deal with in the morning."

The patrol officers put the would-be thief into their car and drove off.

"Car decided on a good time to be temperamental," Jim chuckled. "Just as well I came looking for you."

"Well, from the viewpoint of getting the guy arrested," Blair agreed. "But actually there's nothing wrong with the car - she just needs the right buttons pushed." He got in, and pushed a button on the dashboard. The car purred into life. "Ignition is screwed," he went on, "so I got Mike to give me a push-button ignition. Cheaper than a repair. It's an on-off switch; I want to stop the engine I just push the button again." He did so. "I didn't lie to the guy - the ignition isn't disabled; it's just not where you expect it to be."

Jim shook his head. "Only you," he said. "But seriously, Chief, I was getting really worried. You're very late."

"Blame Chancellor Edwards," Blair said. "She decreed that all grading had to be done here; that if we used our time properly we shouldn't need to take anything home."

"Hmmm... I think I need to have a word with her - or, better, get someone further up the food chain to do it. You could have been killed for that car tonight. If you'd been a girl, you could have been raped and then killed."

"Lisa Tomkins - another anthropology TA - tried pointing out to her the danger of being on campus late, once it was pretty well deserted. Edwards just said that if she did her work properly and didn't waste time, she wouldn't need to be late.

"But it takes more time than Edwards thinks to grade sixty essays. Oh, some of them you can just read through, it's clear the student knows what he's talking about and you give it an A or a B; but there are others that clearly struggle to put their thoughts together in any kind of coherent order - "

"Okay, Chief, you can tell me once we get home. Come on - home, and there's a casserole keeping warm that has our name on it. When is your first class tomorrow?"

"Not till ten."

"Then you can sleep latish. Come on; home!"

Jim waited till Blair started the car again and set off; ran the short distance to where he had left his truck, swung into it and followed Blair.

But he was definitely going to see Chancellor Edwards in the morning.


End file.
